Page 271 of May: Bloom & Bane

“You heard me, little mortal.” I nip at her earlobe. “Show us how you kept yourself entertained.”

Eden freezes against us, her breath hitching hard against our collarbone.

“I—” She swallows, her fingers tightening in the shadow-hair at the back of our neck. “We are a mile in the air.”

“Ohh, we are much higher than a mile, angel.”

Sage lifts her higher. “Are you getting cold feet, Saevúra?”

“I don’t have cold feet,” she says, glancing down, past my shoulder, at the dizzying expanse of white peaks and dark forest stretching beneath her dangling boots.

“Then show us,” I whisper. My lips drag along the column of her neck. “Or did you lie to us? Were you simply sitting in Andrik’s cabin, weeping for your mates?”

“Did you miss me?” she asks, pressing a kiss to my neck.

What is she doing? Sage asks.

Deflecting, I tell him.

“Did we miss you?” I murmur. “We tore our own flesh apart to get back to you, Saevúra. We rebuilt ourselves from sap and bone just so we could hold you like this.”

“We did not miss you,” Sage rasps. “We starved.”

Eden’s eyes widen, glittering under the moon.

“So,” I whisper, our lips brushing hers. “Are you going to answer the question, or do we have to find a very quiet, very isolated peak to squeeze the truth out of you?”

“W-well,” she stutters. “If you missed me… then how about you show me first?”

“But we’re a mile in the air,” Sage mocks.

“Ohh, we are much higher than a mile, angel,” she mocks back.

Do we tell her? Sage asks.

Absolutely not, I chuckle.

“We are feeling generous tonight,” I murmur.

Our lips seal over hers, and she melts into us with a triumphant little hum. She shifts against us, settling deeper into our hold, hips rolling. Her hum dies mid-note. We keep kissing her, neither of us acknowledges a single thing. Our wings beat slowly.

She pulls back an inch and we chase her mouth.

She plants a hand on our chest. “Wait.”

“Hm?” I blink at her.

Her brow furrows, gaze dropping between us, though she can’t see past her belly.

Here it comes, Sage murmurs.

We watch confusion spread across her face.

“... Ash.”

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“When you said—” She pauses. “When you said the things came back one of each⁠—”